Voices
by Spense
Summary: My take, kind of odd, most certainly AU, on the mid season three finale.  Neal makes a trade.


Voices

By Spense

Note: My take (clearly AU) on the final episode of season 3. It's kind of an odd one . . .

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, etc.

Unfortunately, the whole thing worked better than he'd expected. The trade for Elizabeth went off without a hitch, and the woman, who had been drugged into unconsciousness, was left on the wharf. Right next to Neal's cut anklet. Keller had unceremoniously hit Neal in the temple with his gun, putting his lights out. The last thing Neal felt was the speed boat coming to life, and leaving the area that would be swarming with agents very shortly.

Neal had been pretty sure that would be the scenario, and honestly, he was okay with it. His whole life pretty much sucked at the moment anyway. Peter had basically told him to get out of his sight, and implied that once Elizabeth was found, he was bound for prison once again. Mozzie had left with the treasure, making his own choice as surely as Neal had made his. And look how well Neal's choice had turned out. Neal had been left with the shell he'd created, of a suave, sophisticated con man, when at heart, he was a scared little boy left alone to fend for himself.

There had been only one solution, one choice left. So Neal made it, without regrets. Elizabeth mattered, Neal did not. It had always been that way, no matter how pleasant the interlude had been.

WCWCWCWC

Neal came around slowly, once again, lightning pain shooting through him, with Keller's voice an intrusive, unrelenting accompaniment.

"The tendons are so important, and so exposed . . ." Keller's voice was conversational as he discussed the anatomy of a human hand and wrist, all the way to the elbow and how everything was intertwined. He was cool as he sliced the discussed tendon with the razor sharp knife. The knife was so sharp that the pain was actually delayed a moment, as Neal's body took a second or two to realize that he'd been hurt. Neal faded out once more.

" . . . crushing injuries can be the most damaging . . ."

Neal came awake once again to Keller's cool recitation, only to black out once more as the main knuckle on his index finger on his right hand was crushed with a hammer.

Wash, rinse, repeat. And again. And again.

Neal was exhausted, and tired of waking up. Tired of understanding that his life was over, and that it was time to die, already. Nobody would find him, nobody would look for him. He was a bad penny, happily discarded. Peter had made that abundantly clear in his quiet, clearly hissed tirade at Neal back at the house when they'd realized Elizabeth had been taken. He hadn't needed to. Both Neal and Peter realized it was all Neal's fault. Ultimately, Elizabeth mattered, and Neal did not.

Mozzie was gone to parts unknown, Peter had forsaken him, and the FBI would follow their leader. Alex didn't trust him, and the rest of his cohorts in crime were as untrustworthy as Neal himself. It was truly over.

He just wished Keller would tire of the game and hurry up about it.

WCWCWCWC

The faint shouts and loud pops woke him enough to realize he wasn't dead yet. But Neal also knew he didn't want to wake up any more than he already was. Reality wasn't all it was cracked up to be. Then the boat went from bobbing, to wildly rocking (and making him nauseous), and the sound of running feet on deck was intrusive. The faint shouts of 'hands up' and 'don't move' told him at least Keller wouldn't get away. That was a plus. He could die happy now, and he allowed himself to drift away once more.

" . . .it's okay, you're safe . . ." A semi-familiar voice intruded on his quiet, dark peace. Unhappily, he placed the voice. Ruiz. Of the organized crime divison. So they sent the B-team. And specifically, the people on the B-Team who hated him. Not even the second stringers of the A-team. Even if Peter wouldn't come himself, he'd kind of expected Jones or Diana at least. But choices made once again, and their loyalty was clearly elsewhere.

"Come on, Kid. Just wake up for a moment, ok?"

Wait. Ruiz was pleading? That couldn't be right. Ruiz hated him.

"Shit . . . is going to kill me . . . open your eyes . . ."

Ruiz sounded panicked. This really wasn't right. Then somebody touched his hand and lightning struck once more and the world went away.

WCWCWCWC

"Mr. Caffrey?"

"Mr. Caffrey. I need you to wake up, just for a moment."

Neal considered the voice.

"Can you do that for me, Mr. Caffrey?"

Neal decided he didn't know the person, and he really wasn't interested. What was there to wake up to? Nothing but his shell of a persona; neatly dressed, presentable, and witty. He didn't feel like any of that right now. He probably looked more like his grubby soul right now, so why show this stranger the truth? He'd lived a lie all of his life. Why reveal it at the end? It was easier to just drift down deeper, so he did.

WCWCWCWC

" . . . when you feel like waking up, you'll find that you're safe. You're in a hospital, being well taken care of." A young, cheerful, female voice was pattering on above him; an unending white noise.

Neal finally tuned into it, like bringing a radio station into focus.

"You're safe now, and that awful man is in jail. You're going to be just fine. You're healing, just like you're supposed to, and your hands . . ."

At the word 'hands', Neal turned her off, suddenly remembering why he wasn't particularly interested in waking up. The dark thoughts that had been lurking just offshore in his mind. His hands. Keller had concentrated on the one thing he needed for his trade. A forger needed a deft touch, a careful feel and a delicate sense of pressure on a brush. Keller had methodically taken that away, and made sure Neal knew it.

Now Neal had truly lost everything. Peter, Mozzie, and now, the tools of his trade. The crushed knuckles and slender bones, the methodically sliced tendons and the nerves burned with acid. He'd never have the use of his hands again. Keller had assured him of that. And if he did, he'd never have the fine touch and delicate balance that he'd had before; that was so necessary to his craft.

Jealously guarding his peace of mind, Neal slipped back into the safe darkness, rather than wake to an empty room, fear, pain, and hopelessness.

WCWCWCWC

"Well, hello there," a voice said. This time the woman's voice was an alto, smooth and mellow, Neal automatically calculated. "It's about time. We've been taking bets on the color of your eyes. I guessed right," the voice concluded with satisfaction. "Blue."

Neal blinked and realized he was seeing light. It gradually coalesced into a smiling woman in scrubs looking down at him.

"There're really a startling shade, but I'm sure you've been told that many times before," she continued, moving in and out of his sight range.

Neal tuned her out and took in a few details. Cubicle, clearly a hospital. Pale soothing colors in green, blue and mauve. A couple of chairs sitting against the wall waiting for visitors that would never come.

That was more than enough. Neal closed his eyes again.

WCWCWCWC

" . . .awake? Mr. Caffrey?"

Neal didn't realize it, but he'd opened his eyes to see a nurse in surgical scrubs smiling at him.

"Good, there you are. You took a long time to come out of it this time," she smiled.

Neal blinked, not having a clue as to what she was talking about.

Unexpectedly, she seemed to understand. She smiled again, and straightened his blankets, commenting cheerfully, "You just had surgery again on your hands. And you're doing just fine."

Neal allowed his eyes to slide shut and closed out the world at that. A world where his hands didn't work. Where he couldn't run his knuckles delicately over a woman's cheek in a soft caress; where he couldn't feel the consistency of the thick paint as it slid over the canvas, gauging it's thickness. Where he couldn't feel the soft clicks of the combination lock on an expensive safe.

Neal shut down.

WCWCWCWC

"In Xanth, did Kubla Khan, a stately pleasure dome decree, where Alph, the scared river ran, through cavers measureless to man, down to a sunless sea."

Coleridge. Samual Coleridge, Neal's mind supplied as the words rippled over him. He'd always like Coleridge. Of course, truth be told, the man was probably high out of his mind on something when he wrote 'Kubla Khan', but that didn't change the art of the language.

And besides, the comparison was unmistakable. Neal himself had measureless caverns inside of him, full of smoke and mirrors but no substance. And everybody around him knew that now.

"So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round;" the smooth alto voice continued reading.

For the first time, the voice reading the poem was familiar, but Neal didn't want to go there. He was tired of being an object lesson. Tired of being a burden. Besides he must be dreaming. Nobody would be here. He'd burned all the bridges in his life fairly spectacularly.

"A damsel with a dulcimer in a vision once I saw . . ."

Neal was startled to realize that he'd missed much of the poem. It was almost at the end. Just like him. And like his life, he wasn't sure he wanted to hear the end. So he dropped back down in the abyss, running with the river Alph through measureless caverns once more.

WCWCWCWC

Singing. A low contralto voice, rich in shading and tone. It had to be June. How anybody managed to get a recording of June singing was beyond him, but Neal was grateful. Any small act of kindness was appreciated. He fell into the sound and allowed it's subtleties to immerse him.

WCWCWCWC

Pain. This time, shooting pains from his hands awakened him back to awareness. He could hear moaning, then realized it was his own voice. He'd almost forgotten that he'd had one.

"I know, I know," a brisk voice soothed, "but the pain is good. That means everything is healing. And deep massage can really hurt, but it's worth it, I promise you."

Neal's eyes opened on their own accord as he tried, weakly, to pull his hand away from his tormenter. Through watery eyes, he could see a blurry shape holding his hand and kneading the palm, then straightening the fingers. Even as he moaned at the pain, misery personified, he was aware of a sense of surprise that his hand looked surprisingly normal, and not horribly misshapen.

WCWCWCWC

"What through the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower; We will grieve not . . ."

"Wordsworth? Splendor in the Grass? Really, Mrs. Suit? Isn't that a little depressing?'

Mozzie's voice? And Elizabeth's? Neal was convinced that he had to be dreaming, but absolutely couldn't seem to make his eyes open to be sure.

"Mozzie! Stop interrupting me. It's hard enough to get the cadence right without you always arguing about my choices."

Definitely, Elizabeth. But that was impossible.

"You're supposed to be cheering him up, not depressing him!"

Sorry Moz, Neal thought. I like Wordsworth. It's soothing. The words ripple like rain. The images that poet can evoke are vivid and peaceful. Better than Byron, that was for sure. Suddenly, Neal really wanted to hear the whole poem.

Working hard, he managed to wrench his eyes open. It was Mozzie and Elizabeth, arguing with each other. Neal knew it couldn't be, but he liked the dream. He'd do what he could to prolong it.

The voices stopped dead as they caught sight of his open eyes, and Mozzie's grin was huge. Elizabeth smiled at him. "Hi, Sweetie."

Neal blinked slowly. It was all he could manage to do. But Elizabeth seemed to understand what he wanted, even though he couldn't say it.

"More of the poem? Of course."

And Neal closed his eyes and drifted off to the soft sounds of Wordsworth's incredible verses being read aloud.

WCWCWCWC

" . . . and I know I can't thank you enough. I thought Elle was going to kill me right there when she realized what you'd done. I already felt like enough of an idiot, and to have her lambasting me about my lack of common sense didn't help much. "

Neal came awake at the sound of the voice. He couldn't be hearing Peter. There was no way. Peter had washed his hands of him once and for all.

"I don't know if you'll ever trust me again, but I hope I have the chance to prove to you that I do trust you. I'm not even sure I'm making sense, or that you're hearing me. And if you want to hear me apologize for all the things I said, you'll have to wake up."

Peter was worried that Neal might not trust him? That couldn't be right.

"Anyway, it would be a good time for you to really wake up. Your hands are doing great, the ribs have healed, and your hard head is better as well. But the rest of the therapy on your hands needs you awake, and using them. "

It was too much. Neal was overwhelmed. He couldn't deal with Peter right now. Or the remote possibility that Peter might forgive him and even trust him a little. Neal faded out.

WCWCWCWC

What woke Neal this time was the lack of voices. For the first time, he realized he was hearing snatchs of conversation in the distance, footsteps in the hall, dishes clattering, and birds singing. All of the usual white noise that accompanies a normal day. How long had it been since he'd heard any of that, Neal mused. A really long time, he decided. And oddly, he felt whole somehow. Curious, he opened his eyes.

And the first thing he saw was Peter, sitting quietly next to his bed, looking off into the distance, clearly focused inward. Neal blinked, and realized that it really was Peter.

"P-penny . . . for your . . . thoughts?" Neal managed to stutter. His voice was rusty from disuse and his throat ached with every word.

Peter whipped around, a grin growing huge on his face. "Welcome back, buddy!"

Neal blinked again at the response. He didn't get a chance to say a thing. Peter began talking again immediately.

"You look a lot better. Your eyes are brighter and more 'with it'. Elizabeth is going to be furious that she wasn't here for this. She only went home a couple of hours ago. She's been here every minute after the doctor told us you were close."

Neal tried to take this in, but Peter was going too fast. He seemed to realize that because he sat back and took a breath, but the smile never disappeared.

Neal wanted to know a lot of things. He wanted to know why Peter was here, and had Mozzie really come back. But more than anything he had to know the worst. "H-hands," he managed to croak.

Peter's grin faded and Neal's heart sank. Peter bent closer, and picked up Neal's hand, holding it up so he could see it. Encased in a brace, Neal could see the scars. He closed his eyes.

"Oh, no, you don't. Open your eyes, Neal." Peter was insistent, and Neal couldn't resist. He opened his eyes to look at his damaged hand once again.

"Your hands are going to be fine. You've had three surgeries, and we've had the best hand surgeon that we could find fly in to do them. You may need one more, but he assures us that you will have full use and complete feeling in both." Peter paused. "Look at me, Neal. Please."

Surprised, Neal did as he was told.

"Now move your fingers. Just a little. Okay?" Peter cajoled.

Neal wasn't sure he really wanted to try. He'd had enough of pain to last him a long, long time, but he did as he was told. Each finger moved slightly as he concentrated. They did what they were told, much to his surprise. And they didn't hurt. He looked in surprise at Peter.

The FBI agent looked like the cat that had swallowed the canary. He grinned. "Trust me Neal. It will take awhile, but you'll have full use. I promise."

'Trust me'. Neal couldn't believe he was hearing that. But the look of Peter's face was full of determination, and resolve. Peter at his best. Life was beginning to look up.

Neal smiled. Peter grinned back. "Go back to sleep, buddy. Trust me, you're going to need it. I need to make a few calls, and after that, you're not going to get a moment's rest. It will be a mob scene in here."

This time, as Neal dropped off, he could hear Peter's voice, firm and trustworthy. And safe.

~End~


End file.
